


Astride of a Grave

by Kalypso



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen, I love Mary Morstan, Pre-The Empty Hearse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-28
Updated: 2014-04-28
Packaged: 2018-01-21 03:40:08
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1536251
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kalypso/pseuds/Kalypso
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Visiting Sherlock's gravestone with John, Mary's thoughts wander to another London cemetery.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Astride of a Grave

**Author's Note:**

> My thanks to quarryquest for suggesting that Paddington Old Cemetery was the likeliest site for Sherlock's grave in London (the scenes set around it were actually shot at St Woolos, Newport), and to [fengirl88](http://archiveofourown.org/users/fengirl88) and [AJHall](http://archiveofourown.org/users/AJHall) for literary advice.
> 
> The title is drawn from a line in Samuel Beckett's _Waiting for Godot_ \- "Astride of a grave and a difficult birth."

She stands at John's side, looking down at the gravestone of Sherlock Holmes.

It's a good sign that John has brought her here - as if he's finally introducing her to the man who meant so much to him. She's actually quite sorry she didn't meet Sherlock. At first, she thought it was just as well; if he was as clever as John says, he'd have worked out who she used to be, eventually. But after a while it struck her that, if he was as unconventional as John says, he might not have minded. And anyway, he sounded like fun.

The stone is a plain black slab, with nothing on it but the dead man's name in gold letters. Sherlock Holmes. As if nothing more needed to be said, and he couldn't be defined by dates, never mind the sort of sentimental words chosen by many families. But there are bunches of wilting flowers propped up against it. Probably left by fans; she's heard there are plenty of those still around.

Now that he's got her here, John doesn't seem to know what to do. She touches his arm, murmuring "I'll leave you alone for a few minutes." It's you plural she means, suspecting that John needs to tell Sherlock he's found someone new - not a replacement, as such, but someone who can help him to move on again.

She walks quietly over the grass, glancing idly at other graves. It's a good thing Sherlock is buried in Paddington Old Cemetery, well away from Chiswick. Of course, one reason why she looked for a new name in Chiswick Cemetery was its obscurity: a dull 1930s site, cramped between a busy road and allotments, not a place you'd go unless you had family there. Paddington Cemetery is bigger and greener; it feels as if there's room to breathe.

She goes to Chiswick, once a year. In October, on Mary's birthday - _her_ birthday, now - if she can manage it. No flowers; she doesn't want anyone to notice that the grave is visited. Last time, there was a woman tending the next plot, so she kept walking and pretended to be looking at a stone further along the row, commemorating a Polish couple, but she was remembering the inscription she knows by heart:

_Mary Elizabeth Morstan_  
 _2nd October 1972_  
 _Darling Daughter of_  
 _Arthur and Helen Morstan_

_Taken from us at birth_  
 _We will meet again_

She will not meet Mr and Mrs Morstan. Arthur died more than twenty years ago, Helen nearly ten. That was another reason why she chose their daughter's identity, from half a dozen possibles; less risk of anyone finding it familiar. Even so, she sometimes worries that the surname is too distinctive. It will be a relief when John works himself up to propose. Then she'll be able to take cover under the unremarkable label of Watson, the most ordinary thing about an extraordinary man.

She's not sure if she'll be able to visit Mary once she's married - it was tricky the other week, when John made a big fuss of her birthday, and presumably that will continue. Even if he knew the truth about her - which is _not_ going to happen - it would be hard to explain why she goes to Chiswick. Is she there for a stillborn child she never met? Or does she now see the stone as a memorial to a woman more recently extinguished? Does she go to renew her Morstanity at its source, or to remind herself of who she once was? Or maybe it's neither of those, and she's drawn there because there's no grave she can visit for her own child, who didn't even make it as far as a stillbirth.

Back in Paddington, she finds she's almost at the end of the cemetery, walking over open ground that hasn't been used yet. There's a small wooded area by the wall, and a tall box visible between bushes - what's that? Curious, she follows a narrow track around the trees. The box - more like a stack of boxes, held together with a blue strap - oh, it's a beehive! She can see the bees, hovering around the entrance. A beehive in a graveyard. She hasn't seen that before, but it makes an odd sort of sense. Isn't there some association between bees and the dead - a tradition that you have to tell them when somebody has died? Which death should she tell them about? Maybe not one of her own, but the man who's brought her here today.

"Sherlock," she whispers to the bees. "Sherlock Holmes."

She wonders whether their honey is for sale, and whether John would like to have some. Better get back to him now, he's had enough time to do what he needs. She makes her way out of the bushes, and looks across the cemetery to the grave where John is still standing, lost in thought. Another grave that holds far more than the individual whose name it bears: a life cut short for John as well as Sherlock, years of amazing adventures and crazy friendship now taken from him. It's her job to find something to fill that gap, to offer him excitement without betraying that she's a veteran of adventures as wild as his own.

She comes up beside John, and catches his hand.

**Author's Note:**

> I visited both Paddington Old Cemetery and Chiswick New Cemetery on a recent trip to London. 
> 
> Paddington did indeed seem quite a good match for St Woolos.  
> 
> 
> I was delighted to find the beehive in the far corner. I had already heard about it from a website describing the cemetery, which also alleges that you can buy Tombstones Honey, but the staff I spoke to said they hadn't heard about that and would buy it themselves if they had!  
> 
> 
> This is Chiswick, where Sherlock says the real Mary Morstan's gravestone is situated.  
> 
> 
> There were plenty of children's graves there; I have imagined that Mary's looks a little like this one, though without the flowers as there is no family to tend it.  
> 


End file.
